Me and my friend Matthew wrote our own version. I can't remember what it was called but it was some sort of lame Zzap type name,POW or something.
I did all the drawings, including the ones of me and Matthew in various thumbs up/looking miserable poses. I can't remember if we had Rockford and Thing or not or if we invented our own mascot.
Gary Penn occassionally made an guest appearance (Usually in his nightie!) and as we didn't have access to a camera (and wouldn't know how to use it to photo tv screens anyway) I draw copies of the screens using graph paper!
I guess we could have cut the pictures out of Zzap but neither of us wanted to ruin our copies.

I was Editor of the school magazine for one issue (it hadn't been published for a while so I asked the Headmaster and he allowed it). It was a multi-format 'magazine' - it was duplicated on one of those old drum thingys so it comes out in all purple ink. There was no screenshots, just all text. The word processing was done on the schools BBC computers - The night before printing, the computer teachers prefect went and hacked into our files and changed words around so there was tons of mistakes (he was jealous that he wasn't involved). I had time to correct some of the mistakes but not all. I still had several copies until about ten years ago - Wish I still had one to have a laugh at!

(really, I made three 'magazines' -I still have those btw- I cut up all my C+VG's, CU's and Zzap's for the screenshots, and it was sort of a cross of all those magazines. Including nifty hand drawn explanations of symbols and cells, and workers etc. for Hunter's Moon. I also included tips and hi-scores. I translated all the reviews into Dutch. It's quite hilarious to read 'm today. While doing the DEF Tribute I had to think about that period (1987/88) hehe. I'll take a couple of pix of 'm, one of these days.)

Ah, I also made a special 'magazine' about all the games my parents wouldn't let me play, shooting, hack 'n slash stuff, of course I kept that one away from them. I remember my dag getting really angry with me about one of the covers of CU. Luckily, for me and for him, he never saw some of Zzap's covers....

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well nothing is gonna come close to the real article, but i once did a C64 review for a college magazine back around 1989. the screenshots were b/w only taken from a bad photocopy of the Zzap review, but i gave it my own personal Zzap treatment and ratings.

i cannot remember the marks i gave it, except that it scored highly...not that my personal recommendations are anything to go by

This is off-topic but I've just remembered something ZZAP! related that happened at school.

I was sat in an English class and we had a supply teacher in charge. I had finished my work ages before everyone else and thought I would get my ZZAP! out for a read. The teacher told me to come down the front and snatched the mag from me.

I asked for it at the end of the lesson and she told me to come back at the end of the day. So I Did - Took it home and started reading it. I noticed that the wordsearch competiton had been attempted in black marker!

I was not amused!

In fact i had a run in with the same woman (Mrs Lawson) after I had left. I went to the school on a work placement as a computer technician and a teacher asked me to put a notice on the board in the staff room. I knocked once and walked in. She started shouting at me and told me to go back outside and knock and wait till she said I could come in! She obviously thought I was a pupil! Anyway I just walked away...

Later that afternoon she was teaching a class in the computer lab and needed some disks from my little office. She sent a kid in to get them, so she was probably told who I was and felt embarassed!

I was jealous that Zzap! 64 had been relaunched as Commodore Force while Crash had been allowed to die, so I created a Spectrum version called Sinclair Force. I photocopied several pages from the early years of Crash, glued them to new pages, and re-photocopied them. Unfortunately, the photocopier could not print double sided, so I glued reverse pages (e.g. p2 & 3, 4 & 5) together and bound them in a makeshift spine. The 'magazine' was roughly 100 pages in size and the width of a telephone directory. I created a new cover in the style of Crash #1 and wrote an editorial to introduce the magazine.

The 'magazine' was created for my own amusement and I did not distribute or tell anyone else about my project, but it was fun at the time. I found it in my parent's loft a few months ago and spent a few minutes reminiscing.

Wasn't Crash "incorporated" by Sinclair User ? I think there were both names at it's cover for a few issues.

Yes, Europress head office swapped Crash for EMAP's Atari ST magazine. Crash was incorporated into EMAP's Speccy title, Sinclair User, and Europress did the same with the ST title, the name of which I forget.

Ironically, the last issue of Crash contained a suicidally ill-planned April Fool trick which would've come back and bit us on the ass if the mag handn't died. The editor got the team to produce a fake review for a game entitled 'Danny the Duster's Dirty Deeds'. The screenshots were produced on a Sam Coupe art package and the 'review' a complete fabrication. From what I can remember (I must go back and re-read), it wasn't even remotely satirical and there was nothing at the end to make you groan as you realised you'd been had. It simply read like a genuine review.

As the game was described as 'the best Spectrum title ever', reader interest in the title was intense. Everybody wanted a copy, yet it only existed in the minds of the Crash team. It would be difficult to imagine a more gratuitous and unnecessary way of pissing your readers off, and there's nothing particularly clever about catching people with an April Fool that's impossible to spot anyway. Thankfully, because of the sale, it was the Sinclair User team's mailbag that was avalanched with enquiries from readers who couldn't find it anywhere...

I had my doubts. I would have expected it to be previewed or reviewed in YS and SU.

At the time I also thought Solar Jetman was a joke. It was too good to be true.

Quote:

Yes, Europress head office swapped Crash for EMAP's Atari ST magazine. Crash was incorporated into EMAP's Speccy title, Sinclair User, and Europress did the same with the ST title, the name of which I forget.

Ian, did you know Crash #98 was the final issue? When was the decision to swap the magazine made? The editorial and next month page make no mention of it and the 'Crash into SU' looks like a last minute addition.

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